I spent an excellent day yesterday at Portland Bird Observatory and Radipole Lake RSPB Reserve with old friend from way back Richard Crossley, ex-pat Brit, Cape May resident and co-author of the The Shorebird Guide and now well on his way to finishing what could be North America’s best ID guide (more of all of that later etc).

To be honest the birding could have been better (numbers of wagtails and pipits were high but there was little else on Portland), but we did spend a very good two hours at Radipole Lake photographing Mediterranean Gulls Larus melanocephalus (aka Med Gulls).

When I first spent time at Radipole in the early 1980s Med Gulls whilst not rarities were definitely of note. Over the intervening years they have been spreading across Europe at quite a rate, and large numbers now winter in the UK. We estimated that there were at least thirty present - at one point there were eight adults on the Reserve car-park at the same time - but numbers don’t really start to build up until the mid-winter as I noted in a post from January last year: “Once very scarce in the UK, 39 were counted on [Radipole] car-park last week, while another 181 were seen at Ferrybridge [two miles away] the same day!”

I’m formatting a post on 1st winter Mediterranean Gulls (surely the most likely age to turn up - finally - in North America) which I’ll post soon, but in the meantime I thought it would be interesting to post details of two banded adult birds I photographed yesterday. For anyone seeing a banded Med Gull it’s well worth contacting Renaud Flamant who will usually be able to send banding details - or put you quickly in touch with someone who can - just as he did last year when I reported a banded adult, E915538, again from Radipole.

This time Renaud passed on the details of the sightings to Andreas Zours, who is a team manager with the Hamburg Mediterranean Gull team, and to Camille Duponcheel. Both responded later the same day and forwarded on a wealth of information about the two birds - which turn out to have been wandering between the UK and northern Europe since they were born.

Here are the two birds - which for obvious reasons are usually known as AHYS and 3H81. Note the photo showing what AHYS looks like when it’s in breeding plumage - even more beautiful than in winter I reckon: just imagine that black head and those snow-white wings flying down the Hudson River one fine summer’s day…

AHYS, Radipole Lake, UK. 03 October 2009

AHYS, Pionierinsel, Niedersachsen, Germany. 23 May 2009
Photo copyright Simon Hinrichs.

AHYS:
Ringing Place: Pionierinsel Lühe / Landkreis Stade / Niedersachsen / Germany / 53° 35′ N 09° 36′E

3H81:
Ringing Place: ringed as a pullus / 26 May 2005 / Noordelijk Insteekdok, Oost-Vlaanderen, BELGIUM 51,17N 4,13E

So within just 24 hours of photographing two Mediterranean Gulls, neither of which were actually born in the UK, I had details of every sighting that had been made of them in the last few years! The internet - you’ve really got to love it…

*For more information on the quite staggering numbers of Med Gulls seen in Hampshire recently have a look at Paul Winter’s Patchwatch blog.